Client Review

Dee Dee and Brandon are amazing along with the rest of the staff. Every time I or my son go to the bank the staff bends over backwards to make sure we are greeted with kindness and care. If I have any questions they are happy to help and find the answer. The reason I decided to open an account at 53rd is because they have offices back home where my family lives. Now there is no question that I will stay with them because of Dee Dee and Brandon. Blessings my friends.

We are a condo association and we have closed all of our accounts due to the verbal abuse we received from your tellers and your manager Cynthia. Cynthia did not ask why we were closing our 4 accounts.The president of HVCA had to tell Cynthia why we were closing out over $150,000.00 in accounts as Cynthia could care less. When we told her of the issues she said we the customers were wrong. We had 4 accounts and three of them had a lot of money in them but we use it for reserve expenses. Due to lack of activity we could no longer get our statements on line for those inactive accounts. The President of HVCA and myself went into the bank to put a dollar in and out of the three dormant accounts. The teller went a got a "bank" specialist to help her. After 20 minutes they said we were all set and we left. When the 1st of the month came along once again I could only get the one statement and the other three I could not. Sandra the President and I went back in and showed the teller that $10.00 was transferred into the wrong account twice. It was transferred in and out of the same account and not the three dormant accounts. The teller told me because I am not on the account I can't access statements on line. I told her she was wrong and all I needed to access the account is the debt card number and the password that is set up for the account for HVCA board members. She assured me that I can't access on line but Sandra could. We went back to HVCA and sure enough Sandra using the same info I have could not get the statements for those three accounts. Then the teller said that fifth third tries several things to make it work until one will finally works. In other words they will keep trying different things to make the account allow us our statements but it could take several different attempts until one works. WHAT THE HELL DOES THAT MEAN? You can't play with people's accounts until something works. Cynthia also told Sandra and I that the tellers are not trained to do online banking. In the end Cynthia stated to us that her tellers are correct and we are wrong and that they do guess on fixing problems until one works.

We are very happy with our new bank First Community Bank in Harbor Springs. They bent over backwards to get our business and are very professional. Fifth third could learn a lot from them. Your manager Cynthia looks and acts very unprofessional and did not even speak to us while closing out the accounts. If our president did not speak up on why we were leaving your bank, your Manager would never have know any of this as she just handed us our cashiers checks and pointed to the door.

I am writing a formal complaint about 5th 3rd bank. I was banking with BOA (personal checking) CHASE bank (business checking) until my neighbor advised me to switch 5th 3rd bank. He told me that my experience was going to be great as it is a smaller bank than CHASE. He advised me that they would help me save for a house and give me financial advice to get to obtain my short term and long-term goals. I trusted my neighbor as he has financial wealth.

I went to the 5th 3rd branch in Lake Mary Blvd in Lake Mary, FL. I spoke with Brian Panzella, the branchâ€™s Assistant Vice President, and he set me up with a checking and savings account. After opening up this account, I opened up a 401K.

Then, I received several personal phone calls from that branch to move my business account over to 5th 3rd from Chase. I met with Brian again. I voiced my concern about moving my business account over because 5th 3rd has higher balance requirements than Chase. During this time, I also voiced my concern that I was switching jobs and would not have the full required amount of direct deposit going into the checking account for the first month. I did not want to be charged $11.00 fee. I explained that by the 2nd month, I would have enough direct deposit. Brian assured me that I wouldnâ€™t be charged the $11.00 fee if I moved the business over from Chase.

Well, I was charged the $11.00 fee. Additionally, 5th 3rd bank could not correctly print my business name on the debit card. This did not sit well with me. I went into the branch closest to my job and I asked to close out the account. I explained that I was closing out of my account over the $11.00 fee. The account was closed. I signed papers that the account was closed. I moved my business checking back over to CHASE because 1) they have less balance requirements 2) free checks, 3) better office hours and locations.

Several weeks later, I went into a 5th 3rd bank in Casselberry, FL to close out my personal checking account. During that time, I was informed by a banker that my business account had been reopened due to an automatic withdrawal and that I had over $400 in fees. I asked, â€œWhy hasnâ€™t anyone called me?â€ No one had called to notify me of this, but the local branch was able to call me to solicit me for business?!? She said she wasnâ€™t sure why no one called. She did tell me that a letter was mailed to me. She printed a copy of the letter. The address was correct, but I never received it. I explained to her that I live in a condo with a very large mail kiosk and unless they certified the letter, there was no guarantee that I would get it. She told me that I should have signed online to view the account daily. I went home immediately and signed in. The business checking still showed closed. There were no e-mails or alerts that popped up when I signed in. This lady was telling me it was showing reopened on the bank side. However, online it showed as closed. She told me that I needed to go back and talk to Brian at the Lake Mary branch to see if he could waive the fees. This lead me to the impression he could waive some of the fees.

That same Saturday before Christmas, I went and saw Brian. His desk and office were filled with boxes filled with presents from amazon. He explained he was wrapping Christmas presents for his family. He was mid-wrapping when I walked in. He advised me that it is their policy to reopen a closed account if an automatic withdrawal is attempted. They need to charge something crazy like $37 for overdraft, $8 daily fees, $11.00 daily fees. Even though it was one attempt, he explained that there are daily fees for at least 20 days following the attempt. There were all these daily charges that were occurring. Since there was a second attempt, he told me that they would continue to occur for the next 20 days. He told me that he could not stop the charges that were going to continue to occur even though he witnessed me call the company attempting the withdrawal and advised them to stop auto-payments. He was more concerned with wrapping presents than taking care of the customer.

Brian told me that they do not call patients to let them know about overdrafts. That it is â€œagainst bank policy to notify customers that they are in negative.â€ Last year, I worked for a physicianâ€™s private practice. I was a co-signer on the bank accounts. There was a week where the balance went negative. The bank, a competitor of 5th 3rd, called both the owner and myself to let us known that the account was in the negative on a daily basis. This was despite me telling the bank that I was aware and that a deposit would not hit until next week. They continued to give us the courtesy of calling daily.

Brian told me that there was nothing he could do. I asked for the regional managerâ€™s phone number. He told me that her name was Fallon Shields, but advised me that she would be unable to return any calls until after January 2, 2018 as she was on vacation. My father, who was with me, asked him if anyone was covering for Fallon. He advised us that no one would be covering for her while she was on vacation. So as my father pointed out, I basically had to continue to incur additional fees because no regional manager was available.

I went home after leaving Brianâ€™s office. I immediately left a voicemail for Fallon. Additionally, I called customer service. They advised me that there is a standard amount of fee forgiveness. They applied it to my account. I asked why Brian didnâ€™t offer me this standard fee forgiveness. Customer service could not answer me. They agreed that this was not right and told me that I could discuss this with Fallon. I asked customer service for another regional managerâ€™s contact information. Customer service transferred me to an Oviedo branch. I spoke with a Steve at Oviedo. He advised me that he could not give me the name or contact information of the regional manager over that branch. He told me to wait for Fallon to call me back.

The day after Christmas, I went back in to Lake Mary branch to close out my personal account and savings account. At that time, I asked Brian why he didnâ€™t offer me the standard fee forgiveness that customer service gave me. He told me that he did not want to offer it to me since I was closing out my account and that I was no longer a customer. I responded that I was still a customer as I had a personal checking, savings, and 401K at the bank. He just shrugged and told me that he didnâ€™t want to help since I closed out the one account. Was this the excellent service my neighbor was speaking of?!?

After January 2, 2018, I left multiple messages for Fallon. I finally received a call back and from her on January 17, 2017 after all possible charges could hit (remember 20 days-worth of charges). She actually left me a voicemail stating, â€œI got your voicemails. I did not call you back right away because I saw your account is closed and Iâ€™m assuming everything is resolved. If you still need something, you can call me back.â€ It took the regional manager over 2 weeks to return my phone calls. Is this the excellent customer service that my neighbor was speaking of?

Of course, I went back to my neighbor and shared my experience with him. He went down to the Deltona 5th 3rd branch and immediately pulled out over $1 million dollars on December 26, 2018. He explained to the branch manager that he recommended a friend and that I got treated like shit. He advised me that he will continue to pull out the rest of his investments from 5th 3rd. Of course, the day I went to close my account out, I shared this with Brian; that by him not crediting me the standard allowed amount cost him my neighborâ€™s account, which was more than $1 million. Brian and Fallon need to learn that customer service is important. Word of mouth travels and just because my account may not be worth $1 million, my friendâ€™s account may be. Therefore, all customers should be treated with respect and fairness.

Additionally, after searching about 5th 3rd bank online, I found several class action lawsuits were filed against 5th 3rd Bank for unjust bank fees. 5th 3rd Bank has been making money by charging fees to accounts that have already been closed and the previous customers have no knowledge of this. There are thousands of complaints online by people that had very similar situations to mine. I have been mistreated by 5th 3rd bank.

I am asking that as the President of 5th 3rd Bank to please revoke all account fees that have been charged to me. Additionally, Iâ€™d like a written apology from both Brian and Fallon as I have been mistreated and ignored. I am looking forward to hearing from you soon.